Not surprising. In general, memory allocations and copying are to be avoided unless absolutely necessary, if you want efficient code. I've made huge performance improvements to systems simply by getting rid of a memory copy that was located in a tight loop. As the saying goes, "the fastest way to do something is to not do it at all."

Also, does anyone find the term "wait-free queueing" somewhat oxymoronic? A queue is usually something to wait in.